Synopsis: Growing up can be a bumpy road, and it’s no exception for Riley, who is uprooted from her Midwest life when her father starts a new job in San Francisco. Like all of us, Riley is guided by her emotions – Joy, Fear, Anger, Disgust and Sadness. The emotions live in Headquarters, the control center inside Riley’s mind, where they help advise her through everyday life. As Riley and her emotions struggle to adjust to a new life in San Francisco, turmoil ensues in Headquarters. Although Joy, Riley’s main and most important emotion, tries to keep things positive, the emotions conflict on how best to navigate a new city, house and school. – from IMDb

This is one of those movies that my coworkers kept telling me to see and for some reason or another, I kept putting it off. And then, of course, after I saw it, I was sorry it took me so long. This is a family film with a wide appeal that will take you on an emotional roller coaster and make you think about how you process your own thoughts. It puts a different spin on what goes on inside your head as you go through your day and how you handle the changes in your life. It personifies the science, in a sense, and it makes sense. It makes sense that there would be these little people in our heads that help us process our thoughts and emotions. It shows what happens when there is an absence or suppression of emotions, what drives us to make the decisions we do. The premise is surprisingly believable for being a film largely ground in fiction. I loved Poehler as Joy and Smith as Sadness and the two women play off of each other very well. Smith (whom older viewers may recognize from The Office) has a delightfully melancholy voice that gives Sadness a bit of humor, though it typically represents a very low emotion. I also loved the fact that Black (who is an angry comedian) is Anger. Even though the actors aren’t actually physically interacting together, the cast feeds into each other and really bring each of the emotions to life. I kept telling myself that I wasn’t going to cry during this movie, but I have a feeling even the most stone cold of persons may shed a tear or two remembering their own childhoods and their own lost/faded memories. It’s a fun, funny, and thought-provoking film that is sure to please the crowd.